Ludwig van Beethoven declared in 1806 that another composer of his acquaintance was the greatest of any then living. Which of his contemporaries had impressed him so deeply?
A) Luigi Cherubini ü B) Franz Josef Haydn C) Johann Nepomuk Hummel D) Franz Liszt
Haydn, the end of his life approaching, had recently abandoned composition. Liszt, on the other hand, was just nine years old. Hummel was very active, but Beethoven was not terribly impressed with his talent. Cherubini, a lightweight in comparison to Beethoven himself, nevertheless had the great man’s unstinting admiration. Beethoven studied Cherubini’s compositions, and used Cherubini’s opera Les Deux Journées as a model for some aspects of his own opera Fidelio. The regard was not mutual. Cherubini found Beethoven’s playing rough and his manner uncouth. He said of the later compositions that they “made him sneeze”.
